Signing over your soul… twice

It’s been an interesting and successful week, though at times a little nervy. I had my first interview with the media on Tuesday – with the Sheffield Star. I guess when you’re a media-virgin, you go to these things thinking that perhaps they just want the gossip on you, and that you need to watch your tongue in case you say something that may trip you up. Yeah, the Press really does have bad press.
The interview on Tuesday was, thankfully, not like that. The interviewer himself, John Highfield, was welcoming and we chatted as I might with any friend about my writing. I think I got in everything I wanted to say about the book, and I guess time will tell what gets published in the Sheffield Star, and also in the article for Profile Magazine (another publication from Sheffield Newspapers). Yeah two articles for the price of one – not bad, eh?
At the end it didn’t feel like I’d sold my soul. After all, there’s no hidden skeletons hiding anywhere, be it immediate or distant family. My upbringing was safe and reassuring, and I guess there’s no gossip to be had. But being a writer, I admit that prior to the interview my imagination got the better of me – hence the nerves and the trepidation that I was, in someway, selling my soul to the Media Daemon.

The interview in Profile Magazine and the article in the Sheffield Star will be published sometime in January. Obviously, I will put something out on this blog and the website when I know the specific dates.

Selling your soul in the 21st century

That wasn’t the only “infernal bartering” that occurred this week. Finally, after much searching and much disappointment, we have found a house and are in the process of buying it. There’s still a long ways to go before the exchanging of contracts, but with a lot of luck, we should have it sorted pretty quickly. If everything goes to plan, we’ll be moving out of the heart of Sheffield and into the cosy ‘burbs of Dronfield, a great town that nestles in the dip between Sheffield and Chesterfield (both places claiming this fantastic town for itself, though if you ask anyone from “Dronners” where their allegiances lie, most will only smile, keeping that secret to themselves).

But signing up for a mortgage for the first time is very much like signing away your soul. Indeed, as we sat in the mortgage adviser’s office and she went through all the details - the facts and the figures - I couldn’t help but notice the gentleman standing in the corner wearing a nicely tailored tuxedo that just about went down to his cloven hooves, and could not hide the forked tail flitting about behind him. Nor could I help notice the way his smile spread wider as I signed on the dotted line, his eyes burning bright as they traced every flick and dash of pen on the contract.
Indeed, when at last the application was signed by my wife, the Devil melted back into the shadows and I think I almost heard a chuckle.

So that’s it. We are now on the property ladder, and burdened with the sort of debt to make the generation before us tremble with fear. At least we now have a third income, whatever that may be, and it’s most definitely come at the right time. And in the spirit of one of my favourite short stories, and my favourite film of all time, The Shawshank Redemption:

I look forward to moving to our new home.
I look forward to having a garden I can finally relax in.
I look forward to writing new epics in my new study.
I look forward….